On 16 January 2023, EUREGHA members had the opportunity to attend an exclusive online info session on Horizon Europe, kindly provided by Stéphane Hogan from the European Health and Digital Executive Agency (HaDEA). HaDEA has been operational since 1 April 2021 and was established to manage specific funding programs on behalf of the European Commission. Concretely for the health field, this means HaDEA launches the calls for proposals for Horizon Europe Cluster 1 on Health as well as for the Cancer Mission. They are also responsible for monitoring the entire lifecycle of the projects, including those ongoing under the Horizon2020 framework. Similarly, HaDEA implements the EU4Health programme by managing calls for proposals and tenders from 2021 to 2027.

Horizon Europe – Cluster 1 Health destinations include:

  1. Staying healthy in rapidly changing societies 
  2. Living and working in a health-promoting environment 
  3. Tackling diseases and reducing disease burden 
  4. Ensuring access to innovative, sustainable, high-quality healthcare 
  5. Unlocking full potential of tools, technologies, and digital solutions for a healthy society 
  6. Maintaining innovative, sustainable, and globally competitive health industry 

By clicking on the links above you can access brief presentation videos, released in preparation for the Horizon Europe – Cluster 1 Info Day on 19 January 2023.

Cancer Mission objectives:

  • Understanding the disease, risk factors, and impact
  • Preventing what is preventable
  • Optimizing diagnostics and treatment
  • Supporting quality of life of people during and after cancer, while ensuring equitable access for all

Mr. Hogan went on to outline the contents of the Horizon Europe Program, and highlighted several recent calls that could be of particular interest for regional and local health authorities, such as the call for proposals on a European Partnership on Personalized Medicine (HLTH-2023-CARE-08-01) and the call for proposals to establish tools and practices to improve quality of life of cancer patients, survivors, and families in the European regions (HORIZON-MISS-CANCER-01-04), and a few others. He also explained the specifics of proposal submission and review processes, clarifying that partners based in the UK are still very much welcome to join future project consortia. Any remaining questions from the members were answered during the Q&A. 

More information on the Horizon Europe funding program can be found here, or jump directly to the open health-related calls for proposals here.